Violence And The Jobstown Anti-Water Charges Protest.

It is clear that the governments is seeking to split the anti-water charges campaign by modifying the water charges and publicly attacking any violence surrounding the protests.

Courtsey of WSM

A public attack has been mounted by figures from the government parties against the Socialist Party because of the violence surrounding the protest against water charges in Tallaght.These figures, including Joan Burton, claim that the protest had a violent nature and that Joan Burton was subjected to a physical attack and intimidation by the protesters. The SP claims that generally the protest was peaceful and that a few non-protesters were responsible for the violence. It declares that it is against the use of violence such as water bombs being lobbed at government figures.

The Socialist Party exposes its true colours by attacking the use of such violence against government figures. The point is that such attacks should not be criticised by those that defend the interests of the working class. The violence manifesting itself last Saturday is a product of the oppression of the people of Jobstown by capitalism under the political leadership of the current government. It is this government and the system it represents that was the cause of the violence. The violence is a product of the anger generated by the oppression and alienation of the people of Tallaght. There have been cutbacks in benefits, enormous unemployment and low wages, among other things, inflicted on it by the present government. If no water charges were being imposed there would have been no protest and thereby no violence.

It is this that the Socialist Party should be pointing out instead of abjectely opposing the violence that took place. Why should a party that claims to support the interests of the "the ordinary people" express its opposition to attacks on government figures such as Burton and Kenny? It is not the job of communists to protect government figures.

It is clear that the governments is seeking to split the anti-water charges campaign by modifying the water charges and publicly attacking any violence surrounding the protests.

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Comments (8 of 8)

No, the organizers of a law abiding protest are NOT coming out against the other sort of protest if/when they are objecting to the other sort making it impossible for them to hold a law abiding protest. BOTH are tactics that may be useful, and even if we disagree about that (how useful) certainly those who want to do either sort should be allowed to do so.

But those who are trying to do a law abiding protest are hindered in their preferred tactic if the other sort are using them for cover to carry our their tactic. Those of you who favor more forceful means need to take that into account and not do your action in a way that interferes with other protesters.

Oh, you say, separating ourselves out like that would make it too easy for the authorities to come for us. We want/need innocent bystanders to hide behind. Sorry, you are out of line there and doubly so if you then attack those you were trying to hide behind for criticizing you.

Understand? I am NOT criticizing your tactic in and of itself (attack with water balloons) but whether you needed more separation between yourselves and other protesters.

This is from the WSM facebook page and presents a decent view of what the establishment are doing

After weeks of Garda provocation, and just after Garda beat protesters with batons someone finally snapped and threw a single brick back. When a politician as unpopular as Joan Burton uses dozens of riot police to force her way into and out of one of the most deprived communities in the state, what should be expected but angry protest. And when at a moment of unprecedented popular mobilisation those same Garda pull pepper spray & batons for use against water charge resistors what is a single brick bouncing off a car in response.

Of course the mainstream media and political establishment will seize this to try and divide the movement, to set ‘good protester’ against ‘bad protester’. We reject this. The real issue is why is this unpopular tax being imposed and why is Garda violence being used against those who dare to protest. Yes the establishment has chosen to escalate rather than back down, our approach must be unity in the face of that attack and rejection of any attempt to scapegoat those the state tries to criminalise.

Joan Burton can probably consider herself very lucky that in one of the communities that has suffered most from her government's policies, all that happened was she was delayed for a couple of hours. Her government's policies have visited a lot of violence on families in Jobstown and elsewhere

Apparently the gardai discharged a previously standing warrant and arrested a young man in the vicinity of the protest.
It seems likely that the friends of this "young man" with an arrest warrant hanging over him were the ones who targetted the
garda car in response to the arrest of their friend.

Why did the gardai chose this time to discharge that warrant?
It's a poor area, there were a lot of people on the IW protest earlier. the media were about bristling with cameras and no doubt the young man's mates were about, annoyed that their friend was nicked and sitting in a garda car, and likely no friends of an Garda siochana either!!
a provocation to get a response which could be "media linked" to the protest perhaps?

The media showed their true colours in their portrayal of the protesters and their distorted use of language. No doubt this child's water balloon will be used as the excuse to beef up police presence at future protests as is always the case.

The responsibility of the writer as a moral agent is to try to bring the truth about matters of human significance to an audience that can do something about them. - Chomsky

Our media have lost their role as moral agents and clearly cannot be trusted

Perhaps now more folks will begin to understand the pattern in what happened to the shell to sea protesters when the media began to demonise them whenever they protested, and how the gardai got ever more brutal and their numbers got ever larger.

"For those who stubbornly seek freedom around the world, there can be no more urgent task than to come to understand the mechanisms and practices of indoctrination. These are easy to perceive in the totalitarian societies, much less so in the propaganda system to which we are subjected and in which all too often we serve as unwilling or unwitting instruments." - Chomsky

Beware of agent provocateurs in your midst advocating violence coupled with the presence of presstitute media. Agent provocateurs are often people undercover in state employment. They act genuine but use their influence in the group to steer protests towards acts which will discredit the movement then compliant media demonisation does the rest.

Learn form the rossport experience, protest peacefully but assertively. Paddy wants you to "do as thou wilt" but that just plays into the hands of the media and the government. There is really no point in going off half cocked at a water protest. It's just dumb behaviour.
I don't know what the hell Paddy is up to here, but quite frankly it stinks of provocateur behaviour to me.

Violence has it's place in protest when all other avenues of redress are exhausted, but it is certainly not required to win this battle. The government is quite clearly under pressure. All that is required in this campaign is to just keep up the large numbers and non violent protests and they will undoubtedly fold. Then maintain the positive feeling of power this gives you and fight them in the same manner next time they try it on. Because the fact is, the people really do have power but only when we coalesce. We just have to exercise our power together . Then No Government, however corrupt or violent, can resist us..

The water balloon was nothing. Kids throw those at each other. But you have to remember that the ruling classes live in deep fear and paranoia of the people rising up because they know that they have routinely lied to the people what they are up to is wrong and that they are taking advantage of the people for the gain of a few. They know that if it was them on the other side things would indeed turn violent. But it is to the credit of the Irish people that 99.9% of them remained dignified and peaceful while making their power felt and sending a chill up the spine of the political class. Keep it up folks.

The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate. - Chomsky

How does the above relate to coverage of the Jobstown protest I wonder!!

" During the 1960s, large groups of people who are normally passive and apathetic began to try to enter the political arena to press their demands.… The naive might call that democracy, but that's because they don't understand. The sophisticated understand that that's the crisis of democracy." - Chomsky

...sectors of the doctrinal system serve to divert the unwashed masses and reinforce the basic social values: passivity, submissiveness to authority, the overriding virtue of greed and personal gain, lack of concern for others, fear of real or imagined enemies, etc. The goal is to keep the bewildered herd bewildered. It's unnecessary for them to trouble themselves with what's happening in the world. In fact, it's undesirable -- if they see too much of reality they may set themselves to change it.

"First they ignore you,
then they laugh at you,
then they fight you,
then you win"
- Ghandi

There's a war happening in the media at the moment and there was a moment on RTE's Prime Time last night that exemplified this, a woman in the audience described women being assaulted by Gardai on her estate. She specified that they were not near the IW workers when it happened and the ex Fine Gael woman Gemma Hussey basically scoffed at her and said something to the effect of, 'yes becasue you were blocking workers that's why it happened'. The woman didn't retort probably because of the temporary shock and confusion this kind of comment causes, which is the desired effect.

This is 'gaslighting' and it's been used by a lot of Fine Gael td's in debates in relation to the water charges and other issues, I don't know if it's linked to NLP training that they're getting or if it's just instinctual. It's basically taking taking something that somebody has said and flipping it back on them to paint them as the perpetrator as opposed to the victim. It happened with the woman who was flung outside the mansion house also, there were comments such as 'she shouldn't have been near the car' or ' The gardai were only doing their job', she was callously manhandled and thrown towards a rock hard object and somehow it was her fault!. Gaslighting is used by psychopaths and proto-psychopaths in the home, the office all the way up to the Daíl and if more people were aware of it the easier it will be to shoot down in debates.

The unrest at the Jobstown protest was blown out of all proportion and the arrest of the teenager was very suspect in it's timing. The media will try and frame the debate and feign horror at a water balloon being thrown and the gaslighting will continue. I don't envy Paul Murphy as they will throw everything they have at him with this and try and paint him as a devil as a distraction as much as anything else. The real proof of this campaign will be if the critical mass of people refuse to pay the bills when they arrive, to see the government defeated on this would be sweet, sweet wine and to see them having to call a general election would be even sweeter.